Obit in Rolling Stone, which links this article: The Odyssey of Captain Beefheart: Rolling Stone's 1970 Cover Story, 'I'm not even here I just stick around for my friends'.

The NY Times obituary

NY Times: "Mr. Van Vliet's life story is caked with half-believable tales, some of which he himself spread in Dadaist, elliptical interviews."

Rolling Stone (1970):

"When Beefheart learned of the opportunity to make an album totally without restrictions, he sat down at the piano and in eight and a half hours wrote all twenty-eight songs included on Trout Mask. When I asked him jokingly why it took that long, he replied, "Well, I'd never played the piano before and I had to figure out the fingering." With a stack of cassettes going full time, Don banged out "Frownland," "Dachau Blues," "Veterans' Day Poppy," and all of the others complete with words. When he is creating, this is exactly how Don works — fast and furious.

"I don't spend a lot of time thinking. It just comes through me. I don't know how else to explain it." In his box of cassettes there are probably dozens of albums of Trout Mask Replica quality or better. The trouble is that once the compositions are down it takes him a long time to teach them to his musicians. In this case it took almost a year of rehearsal."

NY Times (2010): "But it was 'Trout Mask Replica' that earned Mr. Van Vliet his biggest mark. And it was the making of that album that provided some of the most durable myths about Mr. Van Vliet as an imperious, uncompromising artist.

"The musicians lived together in a house in Woodland Hills, in the San Fernando Valley; what money there was for food and rent was supplied by Mr. Van Vliet's mother, Sue, and the parents of Bill Harkleroad, the band's guitarist (whom Mr. Van Vliet renamed Zoot Horn Rollo). One persistent myth has it that Mr. Van Vliet, who had no formal ability at any instrument, sat at the piano, turned on tapes and spontaneously composed most of the record in a single marathon eight-and-a-half-hour session.

"What really happened, according to later accounts, was that his drummer, John French (whose stage name was Drumbo), transcribed and arranged music as Mr. Van Vliet whistled, sang or played it on the piano, and the band learned the wobbly, intricately arranged songs through Mr. French's transcriptions."

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NY Times (2010): "His band was offered a slot at the Monterey International Pop Music Festival in 1967, but Mr. Cooder had quit a week before, and Mr. Van Vliet was too spooked to perform."

Rolling Stone (1970): [In 1966...] "The Magic Band was scheduled to play a gig at the Fillmore and to appear at the Monterey Pop Festival, both of which could have been springboards to the top.

"Then disaster struck. Beefheart's lead guitar player suddenly quit the band leaving a gap which could not be filled. The unusual nature of Beefheart's songs make it necessary for him to spend months teaching each new musician his music. The departure of the lead guitar destroyed Beefheart's chances in the San Francisco scene. The Monterey Pop Festival went on without him. Those who attended it never knew what they had missed."

~ Becky in Tucson